Farmhands Slacking Off
Lucky's eyes sparkled with excitement, pestering Lily Evans to practice those martial arts moves from the secret manual. Lily covered her face with her hand, inwardly groaning, "Heavens, Mark Hunter, what kind of nonsense have you been teaching my husband?"
"Wife..." Lucky clung to Lily's arm, looking pitiful. "Can we try it, please?"
"No!" Lily gritted her teeth and spat out the answer.
Lucky immediately drooped, rubbing his head against Lily like a sad puppy. "Is it because you think I'm too silly to learn it?"
"Of course not! Don't say silly things. How could I ever dislike you?" Lily's heart softened at his whining, so she quickly pulled him into a hug and comforted him.
"Then why won't you practice with me?" Lucky wrapped his arms around Lily.
"Because... because it's not the right time yet." Lily thought for a moment and said, "This martial arts manual is only for married couples, and it's for making babies. But my body hasn't recovered yet, so I can't have children, which means we can't practice it now."
"Oh..." Lucky was easily comforted, obediently hiding the book under the pillow. "Then let's wait until you're better, and we can practice together."
"Yes! Time to sleep now." Lily let out a sigh of relief, coaxing Lucky to lie down and finally managing to get him to sleep.
After helping Cynthia Wu with her wedding, Lily Evans devoted herself entirely to the mushroom house and the off-season greenhouse vegetables.
The mushroom house was in great shape, thanks to Belle watching over things all day. The laborers did their part well, and it looked like the first batch of mushrooms would be ready in about a month.
But Belle could only do so much. If she watched one side, she couldn't keep track of the other. Lily Evans figured the vegetables she’d just planted should be sprouting by now, but when she checked, she found only a few scattered shoots—most hadn’t even grown a single leaf!
Lily Evans walked around the greenhouse and noticed some straw curtains rolled up, some let down, and some white cloths not hung properly, fluttering in the wind.
Lily's face turned cold. She’d given clear instructions: the laborers were supposed to raise or lower the curtains and cover the cloths at the right times. Clearly, she’d wasted her breath—no one had followed her directions!
Lily Evans was furious. She’d only been busy for a while and hadn’t checked the fields, and already the laborers had gotten lazy!
Lily Evans stormed straight to the laborers’ quarters by the field and kicked open the door, only to find a group of them gathered around playing cards.
"Well, well! Slacking off in broad daylight, hiding here to play cards instead of working!" Lily Evans, fuming, flipped the card table over.
The laborers hadn’t expected Lily Evans to show up for an inspection, and they were startled.
Lily Evans looked at the oldest man in the room—Old Joe Zhou, the one in charge of the greenhouse vegetables.
"Old Joe Zhou, is this how you handle the job I gave you?" Lily Evans fixed him with a cold stare that made everyone shiver.
Old Joe Zhou shuddered and quickly bowed his head. "M-Madam, we planted all the seeds a while ago, and we water them on time every day. We haven't been slacking off! You can check the fields—they’re all wet, we just watered them this morning."
Lily Evans slapped the table and sneered, "You think just planting seeds and watering is enough? Old Joe Zhou, is that how I taught you to farm? Who do you think you're fooling?"
Old Joe Zhou hung his head, but his face showed a hint of defiance. "Madam, I've been working the fields since I was five with my father. Not to brag, but I've farmed more land than you've ever seen. This is how I've always done it, and my crops turn out just fine. So why say I'm slacking off? Madam, please don’t accuse me wrongly!"